The Adventures of Abigail Higgs and Potter Boy
by anne black
Summary: The idea of a misfit schoolgirl catching the attention of the most popular boy at Hogwarts is, in Abigail Higgs' opinion, merely a story in one of the comic books her father is famous for creating. However, with a love of comics and a determination to turn fiction into reality, James Potter would like to disagree.
1. Chapter 1

The One Where James Knocks Me Down

My sixth year at Hogwarts was going to be exactly like every other year that I had spent at the castle, average and uneventful. Which was my life in a nutshell. Although, falling out with my best friend more times than I can even begin to count definitely counted as eventful. So, only half of that statement was true.

My grades were definitely average. Except for my Muggle Studies grade of course, but that was neither here nor there. There weren't many people who classed Muggle Studies as an actual subject, so I'm sure that no one would care about the grades.

As I watched my brother handing my trunk over to the Porter, to place on the train for me, I thought about what sixth year would bring me. Maybe this year Michelle and I would move passed her jealousy and obvious trust issues to have a year of no fall outs? I almost scoffed at my thoughts as soon as they arrived. It wouldn't surprise me if Michelle found a reason to fall out with me whilst we were on the train. Why would we change a habit of a lifetime? It's been well known that humans don't cope well with change, so I'm not sure we could handle not having a fall out.

"Have I lost you in that mind of yours again?" I heard my brother ask me, pulling me from my deep thoughts as I turned to look at him with a sly grin and a roll of my brown eyes. "I'm surprised that we managed to get you out of your room to come back to school. You spent the entire summer stuck in there and not venturing out unless it was for food."

"There's going to be food on the train," I informed him, it was Daryl's turn to roll his eyes before he grabbed me and pulled me into a hug. He was quite a bit taller then me, so his chin resting on the top of my head.

Daryl was two years older than me and had graduated from Hogwarts in the June. He life now consisted of moping around on the sofa and stealing my sweets, as he tried to decide what he wanted to do with is life.

"I'm going to miss you, Abigail." He said kissing the top of my head, I grinned as I hugged him closer, I always hated saying goodbye.

I may be sad about the fact that both of my parents were working, leaving them unable to bring me here themselves. I was glad that Daryl had taken the time to bring me back to school himself.

Daryl let go of me and bent down to pick up the cage that contained my cat Snowball, before handing it to me.

"You best get going before the train leaves and I'm stuck with you again." Daryl told me.

"Just when I think we're having a nice interaction." I said with a shake of my head, the cage heavy in my arms. I gave a smile to him before I began to make my way through the crowds of people on the platform.

I climbed aboard the train and began to make my way down along the carriages. I glanced in each compartment that I passed as I looked for Michelle. I hoped that I would find her soon the cage in my hands was beginning to weigh me down, Snowball wasn't helping me in anyway by moving around. I spotted Michelle after a short time of searching and joined her in the compartment. I gave her a smile in greeting as I placed the cage on the seat opposite her. I gave a huge sigh of relief, I could hear Michelle's chuckle as I took off my backpack before sitting down.

"He is getting quite heavy now; I think I need to cut back on his food." I said as I leant across the seat so that I could shut the door of the compartment, wanting to be able to let Snowball out of the cage for a while. Snowball seemed to not want to leave the cage after I had opened the door of it for him; choosing instead to just look at me. He was beginning to resemble a giant ball of white candy floss with eyes.

"Are you not even going to come out?" I asked him, he ignored me as he decided to lie down in what looked like an uncomfortable position.

Michelle gave a laugh as I rolled my eyes and shook my head. I pushed a hand through my long brunette hair as I turned to look at my friend. I noticed that she had cut her blonde hair, so that it was now shoulder length.

"He is the strangest cat that I've ever met." I informed her.

"Do you meet many strange animals?" Michelle asked me, amusement dancing in her eyes.

"Not that many," I stated as I got myself more comfortable in my seat as the train began to move out of the station. "How have you been? I like your hair."

"Thank you," Michelle said as her hand went to her shorter hair, "Takes a while to get used to but I like it. It cheered me up a bit after finding out that Lucien got the Captains badge instead of me; I felt for sure that this was going to be my year. Now, there's no chance of me being a captain because Lucien is in our year. So, unless he gets kicked off of the team, gives away his captain's badge or just does such a terrible job that he's forced to give up the badge. There's no hope."

I nodded along with Michelle's words as she continued talking. I had heard the same speech over and over since our Hogwarts letters had arrived. Michelle had written to me straight away, telling me that she didn't get the Captains badge. To which I replied with my sadness that she didn't get the badge, even though in all honesty I couldn't care less about Quidditch. I did feel sorry for my friend who had wanted nothing more than to be captain.

"But I finally got that new broom that dad promised me if I got good grades in my O.W.L exams, so that is a bonus. I guess I could put up with Lucien though, give him a few pointers and ideas for plays that he could try out."

I gave a nod at her words as I reached down for my backpack, reaching in so that I could get the drink I had packed in here as well as a few comic books. I pulled out the first one that my hands reached, smiling as I looked down at the cover of it.

I could almost hear Michelle rolling her eyes, "I guess that now is the time when I make my own entertainment," she stated.

She knew me so well.

"Yep, I want to get some reading in before we get to school."

"We've got hours yet," Michelle informed me as she reached into her own back to pull a magazine out for her to read. "So you should be able to get in at least one."

I smiled as I opened my comic book to the page that I had left it at last night, making myself more comfortable in the seat. I heard Michelle flipping the pages of her magazine, both of us falling into a relaxing silence with each other.

Looking down at the pictures on the page, I could see the Hero of the story running from frame to frame of the story as someone chased him.

They all ran through two frames on the comic strip before the hero stopped on the third to shoot some spells backwards. The bright splashes of light from the spells illuminated the previous frame, which the villains were now in.

I felt myself getting lost in the story again as I watched the story unfolding before my eyes. It has always amazed me that no matter how many times that I read a comic book I would always find something different to look at. It was like the story was different each time somehow, It was as though the adventures of the characters were real.

This was the major difference between Wizarding comics and Muggle comic books. The pages of Muggle ones would stay completely still, whereas the Wizarding ones moved. Some would even emit sounds and smells and at times things would jump off of the page at you.

I had an obsession with reading them and yet I didn't know many people that shared the same fascination as I did with them. Michelle had tried to read one but she had gotten bored of the storyline. She didn't seem to understand that she would need to read further in to understand what was going on.

The words, 'You've got nowhere left to run now,' flashed across the page indicating that one of the villains was talking. He was looking at the Hero who was standing on the edge of a cliff, the other villain had perished in the previous fight a few frames ago.

'Face your death like a man,' the words flashed up again. I noticed that it was the crazy one of the two, he had sold his soul a few comics ago to get more power, and it had begun to drive him insane.

The Hero shook his head before raising his wand; the villain raised his as well.

Two sets of words, that I knew were spells, flashed across the page before a flash of colour. The words 'To be continued...' came up on the page, it was a few moments before the entire page replayed itself. I closed the book, eager to learn the outcome of the Hero and Villain. But as this was the latest edition out I knew that I would have to wait a few weeks until my father would send me the next one. So for something to do I decided to flip to the first page and begin reading that edition again.

A few hours and two more comic books later, I decided to get changed into my school robes. I grabbed for my them out of my backpack, ignoring the fact that they would now have creases and stood up.  
I could get the creases out with my wand later on.

"I'm going to go and get changed," I informed Michelle, who nodded at me as she continued reading the magazine from earlier. She hadn't managed to finish it as she had taken a nap for a while, something that I was now wishing that I had the sense to do.

"I'll go and get ready later on, I not sure I have the energy to change yet," Michelle told me with a shrug.

I nodded at her before leaving the compartment and walking down the corridor, the bathroom wasn't that far away.

About ten minutes later I had changed and was beginning to make my way back down the corridor, my normal clothes bundled up my hands. I watched out of the train window as the scenery passed by me in a blur. I was trying to figure out how many days it would be until the next edition of the comic would be out. I wondered if I would be able to survive that long before I would want to explode in an impatient rage. Before I could dwell on that for long I snapped out of my thoughts by a loud yell.

Frowning, I looked up but someone slammed into me and pushed me to the floor as they crashed on top of me.

"What the hell is going on?" I cried before I could stop myself. My back was hurting as was my arse where I had landed. I was going to bruise I could feel them forming already, I attempted to move but the person on top of me was preventing that from happening.

"I am so sorry, Abigail," the person said as they managed to get up off of me and stood up, holding a hand down for me to take. When I looked up I noticed that the person who had barrelled into me was none other than James Potter.

Well, this was different.

I took his hand with a grateful smile and he helped to pull me to my feet. He dusted down my arms before bending down and picking up the bundle of clothes that had fallen from my grasp. He handed them to me as I stared at him, wondering if I should tell him off for hurting me? I settled for just continuing to stare at him.

"I am so sorry, Abigail. I did yell but I think you were in your own little world. It's my fault for running in the first place though; I'm trying to find someone. Are you hurt?" He asked me in concern.

I stared at him for a few more moments before giving a slow shake of my head as I processed his rambling.

"It's okay, I'm just shocked. It's not every day you have someone literally running into you." I joked, James gave a laugh.

"We can tell people, 'hey, guess who I just ran into' and it will in fact be true." James stated with a wide grin, I gave a laugh at his joke and James seemed happy about the fact that I had.

"I best be off, but I haven't hurt you have I, you're feeling okay?" He asked me again, his eyes flickering over me as though searching for any wounds.

"I'm fine, James." I told him, feeling my cheeks beginning to get warm.

"Good. I'll see you around then." He said before running back off down the corridor.

I turned to watch him go with a small frown. I definitely had to admit that this was different. I could not remember an actual time that James and I have had a conversation, or at least one that lasted past, 'Hello'. The fact that we were in two separate groups of people, or social hierarchy as Michelle liked to say, was the reason that we never spoke. We knew who the other was, who wouldn't after being in the same year as each other for six years now.

I walked to the compartment that I shared with Michelle and closed the door behind myself, placing my bundle of clothes on the seat. I noticed that Snowball was now lying on top of my backpack, even though he was completely in my way I was glad that he managed to move from the cage.

"What took you so long?" Michelle asked me, I gave a smile as James' earlier words popped into my head.

"Guess who I just ran into?"


	2. Chapter 2

Waking up early after six weeks of going to bed late was not an easy task, let me tell you that. Michelle didn't want to get out of bed, even though she knew that it was the start of classes today. It took me pulling the quilt off of her to force her to move out of it.

She may have only got out of bed to try and hit me, but I consider that a success.

I wasn't looking forward to attempting to wake her up most mornings, especially as she's old enough to be waking herself up. But I knew that if I didn't she would only moan at me and somehow make it all my fault. So I chose her attempting to murder me for waking her up, then having her fall out with me over it.

There had been times when I had thought to myself that it would be much easier if I got myself another friend. One who wouldn't fall out with me for no reason, or wouldn't make me fear waking her up and feeling her wrath. But there was no point now, It was familiar and I will admit that I will put up with it just because I had for all these years. Why break the habit now?

Michelle stomped to the bathroom and slammed the door shut behind her; I gave a wince as the sound reverberated around the room. If our roommates weren't already up and had gone for breakfast they would certainly be awake now.

"I'm going down for breakfast, I'll meet you there," I called through the door. I waited for a reply that didn't come, before I rolled my eyes and left the room, picking up my bag as I passed it.

It wasn't that long after I left the common room that I found myself at the Great Hall. Us Hufflepuff's are quite lucky in that department. I'd hate to be a Ravenclaw or a Gryffindor, merely for the amount of time that it would take me to get to meal times. At least this way, if I overindulged during dessert, which happened often, I would only have to walk a minute and I'd be able to lie down on my bed and have a nap.

Who doesn't love to nap after eating a lot of food?

I entered the Great Hall and took a seat at the Hufflepuff table not too far into the room. I found a gap beside a small group of first years; it was nice that they all decided to stick together for their first school day. I wonder how long it'll be until they start to drift away from each other, or find new friends to hang around with? Michelle and I spent the first few weeks of our time at Hogwarts with our roommates Isabella Dempsie and Sian Mellor. But after a while we both broke off into our own group of friends. It's not that Michelle and I didn't like them, it's just that was the way it turned out. In fact, it was them that didn't seem to like Michelle. They thought that she tried to take over their lives too much and was always dictating what they all should do.

She still did the same with me, something which at times I hated, but I was and still am a bit of a push over. There have been times that I would have tried to have a talk with her about it all, but it wasn't worth the hassle of having her stop talking to me over it. It was a childish behaviour I know, but I didn't like having to walk around the school on my own when this happened. I would rather she talked to me then me realise that she's basically my only friend.

"Miss Higgs, I have your class schedule here," Mrs Henshaw, the Head of Hufflepuff and my Charms teacher, said as she handed me a piece of parchment. A smile was across her warm face as she looked down at me. I took it from her with thanks and looked down at it. "As you achieved good enough grades in your O. , tyou are able to take the classes that you signed up for during your fifth year. Congratulations."

"Thank you," I said, looking up at her with a smile. I looked back down at my parchment and studied it as she walked away from me and to another student.

I noticed that what would have been my first lesson was a free period and then after that I would be going to Charms. I wondered if Michelle would have a free period as well. If so, she wouldn't be happy to know that she could have spent longer in bed, but it's not my fault that she's not a morning person.

She'd somehow make out that this was my fault.

I was tempted to go back to the dormitory and make sure that she didn't go back to sleep. Maybe she would appreciate that I had woken her up so that she didn't miss getting her schedule. She would have had to go to Mrs Henshaws office to get it and possibly missing her first lesson of the day. But she walked through the doors of the Great Hall, her blonde hair up in a ponytail.

I noticed that she didn't have an angry look on her face, but she did have a tired one. She sat down opposite me and gave me a nod in greeting as she grabbed for some coffee and poured it into a cup, before beginning to drink it.

"Black coffee without any milk or sugar?" I enquired with her. "You must be tired if you're touching that."

Michelle nodded as she winced at the hotness of the coffee, "I didn't get much sleep last night. I think it was the excitement of the first day of classes starting?"

I wasn't sure if she was being serious or not. It didn't sound like something that she would say to me, it had to be a joke.

Mrs Henshaw made her way back down and handed Michelle her schedule. Telling Michelle that she had achieved good enough grades to continue on her lessons that she had taken the year before. Michelle had stated that she wanted to drop Muggle Studies though. The teacher wasn't too happy and neither was I actually. But the teacher waved their wand and the schedule changed so that Muggle Studies would be removed.

"Don't give me that look, Abigail," Michelle told me as she looked at her schedule. "I hated that class, it was boring."

"Learning about Muggles isn't boring."

"Maybe not for you, but I grew up around them; it's not that fun anymore."

I was about to open my mouth and ask her who I was going to sit next to now, when she said something that shut me up.

"James is facing this way." She nodded behind me and I turned to see where she was looking at the Gryffindor table. By the time I found where James was sitting he was talking to his friend. I turned back around to face Michelle. "I bet you wouldn't mind if he 'ran' into you again,"

I rolled my eyes at Michelle. "It was an accident."

"Of course it was an accident, there's no way James would have talked to you otherwise. He was just being polite because he knocked you both to the ground," she told me, causing me to want to do nothing more than curl up into a ball. She was right, I knew she was, but it still hurt to hear it.

"He has talked to me before, we said hello to each other once and he leant me a quill back in the third year."

"Which you did not give back and you had framed,"

"I did not frame it," I told her.

"You probably would have if you had the chance."

"No, I wouldn't." I stated shaking my head again. "I'm not that weird. Besides, I don't have a crush on him anymore."

Michelle gave a scoff next to me and I rolled my eyes at her.

"I know you still have a crush on him, it's obvious to everyone, Abigail. I wouldn't be surprised if James knows and him talking to you now is the start of him telling you to back off."

My frown deepened at her hurtful words. I could have easily mentioned Michelle's obsession with Ethan Richards that she had since last year. But I wasn't mean enough to say something to her or make fun of her. So I settled for a sigh again and continued to eat my food. Listening to the chatter of the people around me, catching up with each other and telling stories about their holidays.

I tried to resist the urge to look back at James; he was sitting with his friend William and some of the other Gryffindor boys from our year. I didn't know what I was expecting looking up at him before. That maybe he would be watching me?

I frowned as I stabbed my fork into my food and my mood soured.

I was kidding myself; we talked on the train because he was apologising to me, there was nothing more. There never would be anything more and I knew it. Feeling the weight of dejection and embarrassment flooding through me. I wanted nothing more than to leave the Great Hall and to be up in her dormitory reading and being with my cat. At least my cat loved me, although that was probably only because I was the one who fed him and fussed over him.

"Oh come on, Abigail, there's no need to get your wand in a knot," Michelle said to me with a small laugh, "I was only having a joke with you; you need to stop being so sensitive all the time."

I wanted to tell her that the reason my 'wand was in a knot' was because of what she had said to me. I wanted to tell her that she needed to start treating me a lot better, I was growing tired of her jokes. Maybe this year could be the start of a new Abigail? One who spoke her mind and didn't let anyone walk over her.

I looked up at her; she rolled her eyes at me and shook her head, "I'm going back to the dormitory, when you get over this come and find me." She pushed away from the table and stood up, leaving the room, her half eaten plate of food left behind.

I wish I wasn't such a bloody push over; that should have been me walking out of the Hall, and I should have been the one who had the last word.

I gave a sigh as I placed my knife and fork down on the table and stood up myself. Pushing my hair out of my eyes, I turned around so that I could make my own way out of the Hall. I let myself glance over at where I knew James was sitting and noticed with a clench of my stomach that he was looking at me again. He gave me a smile and small wave when he noticed that I was looking at him. I waved back awkwardly at him before I darted out of the room, knowing that I looked like a fool in doing so.

Damn! Why couldn't I behave how I did back on the train? Why did Michelle have to voice my own fears about James only talking to me because he had to and turn me into an even more pathetic mess?

She had managed to zap every bit of confidence I had at talking to James from me and I was annoyed at myself for letting her. Maybe I could work on going back to the Abigail I was when James was talking to me on the train?

I walked slowly away from the Great Hall, not knowing what I was going to do between now and my lesson; I had a whole hour to waste. Maybe I could use this time to work on what I wanted to change in my life? Work on my confidence and summon up the courage to tell my supposed best friend that she needed to be nicer to me. I felt unease spread through me at those thoughts. I knew that I couldn't stand the thought of falling out with her and having to deal with being alone because I had no other friends. I knew that I was going to find her and apologise for being so sensitive about things, even though I didn't believe that I was in the wrong.

I really hated myself sometimes.


End file.
